Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Blazing A New Trail Near Our Home

My shadow as I pull up late in the afternoon..what is that beside the sign? A new trail!

I’ve been
seeing a “Road Work Ahead” sign on the Cedar Rapids end of the trail that runs
behind Walgreens on C Avenue NE in my neighborhood, and cynically assumed it
would take years for the city to actually do anything with this trail.

Well, CR
Public Works, I take back my cynicism.Suddenly,
in the course of maybe a week, a sleek new limestone trail has magically appeared.

I noticed,
as I zoomed by on C Avenue Monday night on my commute home, something looked a
bit different, so I turned around to investigate.Sure enough, a new access to the old rail
line had been created at the end of a dead-end street.

The start of
the trail looked a bit mushy—we had two inches of rain over the weekend.And Audrey was due to come home soon—we had
planned to go for a walk.So I rode home,
texted her that there was a new trail, and we decided to walk it.

Well, it was
slightly mushy in parts, but in surprisingly good shape. As far s I can tell, the city is done putting most
of the limestone down, and just has a bit of shoulder fill to move in before
Miller time (or should it be Fat Tire time?).

The shaow of the walkers--Audrey and I head away from the sunset along the new trail. Clearly, we are not cowboys or we would be going the other way.

We walked a
loop, first going to Lindale Avenue in Marion, then back north through a quiet
residential neighborhood to the short west trail that runs beside the longer
Boyson Road trail.We headed back home,
passing by Bowman Woods School on Boyson Road.The loop we walked was about an hour long—which makes it just about the
perfect length for the occasional evening constitutional, and along this walk we
crossed no busy streets at all.

Well, cool
for you, CR.Thanks for putting in this
trail.My late fall bike riding has just
gotten better.

Eventually,
years from now when the CENMAR trail is finished, this new trail will be my commuting
route, and I’ll be able to ride all the way to MMU with only the short sidewalk
jaunt to Walgreens being pre (or post) trail.

Yeah, it was
a nice way to end a very nice ride.Although the ash trees are spent, there were still lots of pretty maples
to enjoy on my ride.Happy trails!

This photo and below are in the neighborhood east of Harding Middle School and Noelridge Park. I had taken the Cedar River Trail north through town, not knowing that there were more trail adventures in store.

About Me

Associate Professor of Communication at Mount Mercy University, Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Father of 6, grandfather of 8 and counting. One son in family of 7--I have 6 sisters (but I also didn't have to wear hand-me-downs much).